IS THE BIBLE

THE WORD OF GOD?

 

               A Rational Defense of

  the Judeo-Christian Scriptures

 

 

Can we know rationally that the Bible was inspired by God? Can fulfilled phophecy prove the Bible is God’s Word?  Is there more evidence to show the Bible is historically accurate?  How do we know the Bible is the Word of God instead of the Quran (Koran) of Islam?

 

                            By Eric V. Snow

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

                                          

 

IS THE BIBLE THE WORD OF GOD?

                  A Rational Defense of the

              Judeo-Christian Scriptures

 

 

                              By Eric V. Snow

 

                       TABLE OF CONTENTS

 

 

Introduction:  Why Should the Bible Matter

to Us Today?.....................................................................  5

 

The Old Testament Successfully

Predicts the Future.............................................................    

.

 

How Can Someone Judge Whether the

Bible is a Historically Reliable Document?.......................... 19

 

 

How External Historical Evidence

Confirms the Bible.............................................................. 37

 

 

The Internal Evidence Test:  Does

the Bible Contradict Itself?................................................. 53

 

 

The Life and Death of Jesus:

Implications for Belief........................................................ 60

 

 

A Brief Look at the Quran (Koran)

of Islam.............................................................................. 70

 

 

Endnotes............................................................................ 74

 

 

 

                                            1

 

 

                     INTRODUCTION: 

    WHY SHOULD THE BIBLE MATTER

                        TO US TODAY?

 

 

 

Is the Bible the infallible word of an Almighty God, as fundamentalist Christians believe?  Or is the Bible a collection of Hebrew myths and legends, as atheists and agnostics allege?  Do you believe in the Bible by faith alone, trusting that the faith of your parents was correct?  Is there any way to prove the Bible is the word of God instead of the Islamic holy book, the Quran (Koran)?  Does historical and archeological evidence favor the Bible, or are they against it?  Can the Bible's inspiration be proven by human reason?  Does God allow us to believe in any religion we want, because "all ways lead to God"?  Do human beings live in a world without meaning, in which random natural processes created their bodies and they decompose them for similar reasons?  Is the purpose of life merely to maximize pleasure and minimize pain while avoiding getting "caught"?  Or do men and women's lives have purpose, because an Almighty God is working out a great plan of His own here below?  If the Bible is the Word of God, what is your part in God's plan for humanity?  Are there any real answers to the mystery of life?  Or are we just supposed to try to figure it all out on our own, using human reason and emotion to stumble along? 

 

DOES THE HYPOCRISY OF BELIEVERS ALLOW OTHERS TO SAFELY REJECT THE BIBLE?

 

Before considering the evidence for the Bible, it's necessary first to consider two popular objections to belief in it:  The hypocrisy of many believers in it, and whether "all paths lead to God."  Taking up the issue of Christians believing one thing yet doing another first, many people will reason:  "Because my relative, friend, co-worker, boss, or that famous TV evangelist or politician is a hypocrite while professing Christianity, therefore, I won't believe in the Bible."  Fundamentally, this argument is unsound for a very simple reason:  As a matter of philosophical logic, the Bible is true or false regardless of the behavior of those believing in it.  Whether Jesus is or isn't the Son of God and the Savior of humanity has nothing to do over how dishonest is (say) your brother-in-law who claims to be a Christian.  Furthermore, each individual's spiritual status before God is determined individually, by one's own conduct and faith, not by someone else's.  The sins of (say) a minister who committed adultery have nothing to do over what someone else's spiritual status is before God:  One's own actions and faith determine that, not his.  If God wishes someone to be a Christian (John 6:44; Eph. 1:4-5; Rom. 8:29-30), the sins of some Christian one knows won't save one if one commits similar sins.  As the prophet Ezekiel wrote:  "The son will not bear the punishment for the father's iniquity, nor will the father bear the punishment for the son's iniquity; the righteousness of the righteous will be upon himself, and the wickedness of the wicked will be upon himself" (Eze. 18:20).  The sins of someone professing Christianity don't cancel out God's commands for someone else.  The proper response to seeing someone who sins yet says he or she is a Christian isn't, "That allows me to do as I please!," but, "I shall do better!" 

Then, we need to consider how someone who professes Christianity who sins (say) half as much as he used to is better than the equivalent person who still denies Christianity whose behavior is totally unaffected by God's commands.  It's also unfair to demand perfection of others who uphold an absolute morality, while committing the same sins oneself, since human frailty and weakness will inevitably manifest itself in all individuals.  (We just tend to overlook the problems we cause for others, saying we had good excuses or motives, while judging others as having the worst possible motives when they do something that hurts us or someone we love).  The Bible makes it plain that Christians will sin sometimes (I John 1:8-9):  "If we say that we have no sin, we are deceiving ourselves, and the truth is not in us.  If we confess our sins, He is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness."  Finally, often people will reason, "Because professing Christians killed people through the Crusades, the Inquisition, the Troubles in Northern Ireland, the Thirty Years War, etc., therefore, I refuse to believe in the Bible."  This argument is rarely run against the other side, though logically it should be:  How many people have given up belief in atheism due to the sins of the communist dictators Joseph Stalin and Mao Tse-Tung, who butchered roughly 100 million people between them?  The body count that atheists have run up in this century alone far exceeds anything that the Roman Catholic Church has accomplished over the past (say) 1700 years combined.  Therefore, using the sins of professing Christians to reject the Bible is illogical, since the sins of others don't cancel out God's law as it applies to us individually, and the truth or falsity of the Bible (or God's existence) is logically independent of the sins of anyone believing in it (or Him).

 

                  HOW DO WE KNOW FOR CERTAIN THAT "ALL

                              PATHS LEAD TO GOD" IS TRUE?

 

Do all paths lead to God?  Can we be saved regardless of our beliefs, so long as we are sincere enough?  The Bible is very clear that there is only one path to God, not many:  "Jesus said to him, "I am the way, and the truth, and the life; no one comes to the Father, but through Me" (John 14:6).  Similarly, the apostle Peter said:  "And there is salvation in no one else [Jesus]: for there is no other name under heaven that has been given among men, by which we must be saved" (Acts 4:12).  Saying "all paths lead to God" sounds nice and tolerant, but is it in fact true?  What sounds nice may actually be false!  (Consider how many think the dogmas of Marxism sound nice, yet they unleashed rivers of blood in practice!)  This statement needs investigating before we accept it, just like any other important belief we have, not mere blind, unthinking acceptance.  Today, in our pluralistic, multicultural society, it's condemned as intolerant and politically incorrect to say there is only one true religion.  But if an Almighty God inspired these two statements, and they are true, it doesn't matter what any human thinks otherwise.  Our job then is to line up our lives with Him, and proclaim that truth to others, regardless of what others may think.  The Bible clearly states that there is only one God and one true religion.  To say otherwise, and believe (say) Hinduism, Islam, and Buddhism are also true religions, is to deny the Bible.  For true Christianity, it's incorrect to say that believers in an absolute truth will cause them to persecute others.  Although so many professing His name have violated this, Jesus made it clear Christians are to love their enemies, which means persecuting non-believers is always immoral (Matthew 5:44):  "But I say to you, love your enemies, and pray for those who persecute you."  Likewise the apostle Paul wrote (Romans 12:17-18):  "Never pay back evil for evil to anyone. . . .  If possible, so far as it depends on you, be at peace with all men."  Sincerity simply isn't enough, since one can be sincerely wrong:  Consider all the enthusiastic believers in communism in this century, truly a god that failed.  We need to be rational in our religious beliefs, and not just determine them by emotion and tradition alone.  But now‑‑how can we know whether the Bible is right when it proclaims it has the only true way to reach God?

 

                 HOW THE BIBLE CAN RATIONALLY BE PROVEN

                                   TO BE THE WORD OF GOD

 

The Bible has the answers‑‑but how do you know whether these are the right ones?  Suppose you were raised knowing nothing about the Bible, Old Testament or New Testament, like some tribe in the jungles of New Guinea or along the Amazon in Brazil.  One day, a missionary comes along, and drops on you a copy of the Bible.  Suppose it was in your own language and you are literate enough to read it.  How could you judge whether its contents are true?  Suppose a competing religion's missionary left a Quran (Koran) behind.  How could you judge whether that book was reliable?  To be rational in our religious beliefs, instead of just blindly following what our parents believe, we need to apply reason and not just emotion to figuring out what our religious beliefs should be.  Later on in this booklet, evidence for the historical reliability of the Bible is presented.  But first, fulfilled prophecy is presented as the ultimate proof for the Bible's inspiration.  Historical accuracy merely is a necessary condition for inspiration, not a sufficient one.  A book could be perfectly accurate historically, such as one on the life of Abraham Lincoln, yet not be inspired by God or hold any authority over our lives.  Historical accuracy merely keeps the Bible from being ruled out as the Word of God, but by itself doesn't present much of a positive case for its inspiration.  But it's another story to explain how the Bible could predict the future in advance accurately centuries after its prophets died.  Rationally, this requires belief that its authors received supernatural guidance.  Below prophecies that were fulfilled after some part of the Bible was written but before the twentieth century are examined.  Predictions of events yet to happen, such as judgment day, the second coming, the resurrection of the dead, etc. aren't examined here, because they have yet to happen.  Hence, although the Quran may predict repeatedly a day of judgment, that does little to prove God inspired it since that event hasn't happened yet!  So let's explore the evidence that the Bible successfully predicted the future, which leads us to infer that its authors received supernatural help.

 

                  PART I:  THE OLD TESTAMENT SUCCESSFULLY

                     PREDICTS THE FUTURE:  BABYLON'S FATE

 

The great Hebrew prophet Isaiah prophesied in the general period c. 740-700 b.c.  Long before the King of Babylon, Nebuchadnezzar, destroyed Jerusalem, Judah's capital, in 586 b.c., Isaiah predicted the destruction of the city of Babylon itself.  Note Isaiah 13:19-20:  "And Babylon, the beauty of the kingdoms, the glory of the Chaldeans' pride, will be as when God overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah.  It will never be inhabited or lived in from generation to generation . . ."  This vast city had (if the ancient Greek historian Herodotus is trusted) a 56-mile circumference and 14-mile long sides, with walls 311 feet high and 87 feet wide.  These figures appear exaggerated:  Archeological digs indicate the inner city had double inner walls of twelve and twenty feet wide and double outer walls twenty-four and twenty-six feet wide.  Nevertheless, since sometimes dirt was put into the area between the double walls such that four horses' spans would fit, Herodotus's figures on the width of the walls weren't that far off.  Occupying some 196 square miles (including protected farmland within the outer walls), it was one of the ancient world's greatest cities.  In modern terms, Isaiah's prophesy would be the equivalent of predicting the complete devastation and permanent desolation of New York, London, or Tokyo.  Situated on the Euphrates River in what is now Iraq, Babylon had been a great center of Middle Eastern culture for some 2000 years.  Additionally, predicting the site wouldn't be rebuilt upon again was very bold, since this commonly happened after a city's destruction in the ancient Middle East.  After the Greek geographer and historian Strabo visited the site of Babylon during the reign of the Roman Emperor Augustus (27 b.c.-17 A.D.), he commented jokingly:  "The great city is a great desert."  It hasn't been rebuilt since either!

 

                   THE DESTRUCTION OF NINEVEH PREDICTED,

                 ONCE THE CAPITAL OF THE ASSYRIAN EMPIRE

 

Nineveh, the capital of the Assyrian Empire, was a great city on the Tigris River in what is now Iraq (ancient Mesopotamia).  Willingly burning cities, the Assyrians's cruelty inspired hatred from those they conquered.  Sample punishments they inflicted included skinning people alive, burning children, impaling enemies on stakes, and chopping off hands and heads.  Writing around 627 b.c., the prophet Zephaniah predicted Nineveh's destruction along with the Assyrian Empire's:  "And He [God] will stretch out His hand against the north and destroy Assyria, and He will make Nineveh a desolation" (Zeph. 2:13).  Writing between 661 and 612 b.c., the prophet Nahum predicted Nineveh's destruction (Nahum 2:10; 3:19), with the help of a flood (Nahum 2:6) and fire (Nahum 3:13), during which many of its people would be drunk (Nahum 1:10).  Like Babylon, Nineveh was one of the ancient world's greatest cities.  Its inner wall was 100 feet tall and 50 feet thick, complete with a 150-foot-wide moat.  It boasted a 7-mile circumference.  But all this couldn't save it!  As predicted (Nahum 3:12), the city fell easily, after a mere three-month siege, to the combined forces of the Medes, Scythians, and Babylonians under Nabopolassar in 612 b.c.  Showing this wasn't all mere coincidence, guess work, or hopeful wishing, all of Nahum's specific predictions about how Nineveh would fall were fulfilled.

 

                        SWITCHING THE NAMES OF THE CITIES

                IN THE PROPHECIES WOULD MAKE THEM FALSE

 

Now let's examine more closely the fate of Babylon and Nineveh, which were by no means fully identical.  Since both cities were capitals of nations that were major enemies of Israel, Israel's prophets easily could have switched the names of these cities.  Then they would have predicted wrongly, if they had not been inspired by God.  Although both cities suffered destruction, Babylon was clearly predicted to never be inhabited again, but this was never prophesied for Nineveh.  Today, the site of Babylon is totally uninhabited.  The Euphrates River, which still flows through the site, has eroded the ruins on its west side, turning them into a swamp.  On its east side, the ruins are mere low hills of debris.  Isaiah predicted wild animals would inhabit the ruins.  No shepherd would remain there, or stay to rest their flocks (Isa. 13:20-22).  As Floyd Hamilton relates, this has literally happened:  "Travelers [to Babylon] report that the city is absolutely uninhabited, even [by] Bedouins [Arab nomads].  There are various superstitions current among the Arabs that prevent them from pitching their tents there, while the character of the soil prevents the growth of vegetation suitable for the pasturage of flocks."  By contrast, even when the nineteenth-century archeologist Austen Henry Layard investigated the site, a small village sat upon the ruins of Nineveh, nowadays near the outskirts of Mosul, Iraq.  Unlike Babylon, the plains around Nineveh's mound are farmed, and animals can graze on it during seasonal rains.  Significantly, the site's largest mound has an Arabic name meaning "many sheep."  Clearly, if Isaiah had condemned Nineveh instead of Babylon, which would have made sense when he wrote since Assyria was much the greater threat to Israel and Judah in the eighth century b.c., his specific predictions about site of its ruins would have been wrong.  The skeptic can't argue that it's easy to predict the destruction of ancient cities, thinking in time all cities eventually will be destroyed.  The Bible also predicts specifically how these cities would cease to exist, so these predictions can't be called mere lucky guesses.  Furthermore, many ancient cities of the Middle East are still inhabited today, such as Damascus, Jerusalem, Sidon, Aleppo, etc.[1]  Why was Babylon's fate different, its site now having been desolate for centuries after being a center of Mesopotamian civilization for centuries, a city dwelled in for perhaps over two thousand years?  Because the God of the Bible yet lives, He intervenes in the affairs of men!

 

                     THE ANCIENT PHOENICIAN CITY OF TYRE

                     PROPHESIED TO BECOME "A BARE ROCK"

 

The seacoast of what is now Lebanon once was the center of the ancient  maritime civilization of the Phoenicians.  Two of their leading cities were Tyre and Sidon.  Colonists sent out from Tyre settled in and established the city of Carthage in what today is Tunisia in north Africa, which later fought (and lost) the three Punic Wars against the Roman Republic in the period 246-146 b.c..  Tyre was most unusual, since one part was built on the mainland opposite the remainder occupying an island about a half mile off the coast.  God through the prophet Ezekiel condemned Tyre, predicting its complete demise: 

 

Thus says the Lord God, 'Behold, I am against you, O Tyre, and I will bring up many nations against you, as the sea brings up its waves.  And they will destroy the walls of Tyre and break down her towers; and I will scrape her debris from her and make her a bare rock.  She will be a place for the spreading of nets in the midst of the sea, for I have spoken . . . and she will become spoil for the nations.' (Ezekiel 26:3-5)

 

This prophecy initially was fulfilled in several steps.  First, as Ezekiel 26:7-11; 29:18 described in advance, the Babylonian king Nebuchadnezzar besieged the part of Tyre that was on the mainland for some thirteen years (585-573 b.c.).  He was robbed of the fruits of victory:  After his army broke down its walls and occupied it, he found most of the people (and their transportable wealth) had departed for the island city off the coast.  Since Tyre had a strong navy, he couldn't attack it without a fleet.  When Tyre made peace, it only admitted to Babylon's suzerainty (limited overlordship).  Nevertheless, by destroying the mainland part of the city, Nebuchadnezzar fulfilled part of Ezekiel's predictions.

 

                      ALEXANDER THE GREAT ATTACKS TYRE,

                FULFILLS MORE OF THE PROPHECY AGAINST IT

 

Significantly, Ezekiel uses "he" to refer to Nebuchadnezzar in verses 8-11, but switches over to a more anonymous "they" for verse 12:  "Also they will make a spoil of your riches and a prey of your merchandise, break down your walls and destroy your pleasant houses, and throw your stones and your timbers and your debris into the water."  Surely this wasn't the normal fate for an ancient city's rubble, since usually when ancient cities were rebuilt, the new buildings were conveniently placed on top of the old ones' remnants.  What could possibly cause anyone to go through this much bother, to throw a city's ruins into the sea?  The main part of the "they" was the next major actor in the drama of Tyre's fate, Alexander the Great (356-323 b.c.).  During his campaign of conquest against Persia, he attacked Tyre (332 b.c.) after it denied him permission to sacrifice to the Tyrian god Heracles.  He insisted on making the offering in the temple dedicated to Heracles on the island off the coast, not the one in the mainland part of Tyre.  (The mainland city had been partially rebuilt after the destruction wrought by Nebuchadnezzar over two centuries earlier).  In a remarkable operation, Alexander besieged the island city by taking the rubble of the old mainland city and throwing it into the Mediterranean to build a causeway out to it.  After building this land bridge, his army intended to place siege engines up against the island city's strong walls, which seemingly jutted up right out of sea.  The siege lasted seven months‑‑once Alexander gained naval supremacy, the city's conquest followed in short order.  He punished Tyre by executing 2,000 of it leading citizens and selling 30,000 of those left alive into slavery.  Ezekiel prophesied that Tyre's walls and towers would be broken down, and that God "will scrape her debris from her and make her a bare rock."  It happened!  In order to build the 200 foot wide causeway into the sea about a half mile, Alexander's army left no visible ruins behind.  Is this all mere coincidence?

 

      IS  THE  PROPHECY  AGAINST  TYRE  TOTALLY  FULFILLED?

 

Ezekiel 26:14 predicted:  "'And I will make you a bare rock; you will be a place for the spreading of nets.  You will be built no more, for I the Lord have spoken,' declares the Lord God."  Have these predictions been fulfilled?  Clearly, the part concerning the spreading of fishing nets was.  After visiting the site of Tyre in recent years, Nina Nelson noted "Pale turquoise fishing nets were drying on the shore."  The mainland city became a bare rock due to Alexander's actions in building the causeway, but what about the island city off the coast?  Although it never recovered its former great power, it was rebuilt, becoming a major port in the time of Christ during the first century.  But after the Muslim Mamelukes captured it from the Crusaders during the Middle Ages, they completely wiped it out in 1291.  They wished to ensure some future possible counterattack wouldn't recapture its fort and use it against them again.  Today, a small fishing town of about 12,000 sits on the site of ancient Tyre, due to the Metualis reoccupying the island city site in 1766.  The mainland city site remains abandoned, despite it has large natural freshwater springs.  Since the town of Sur occupies part of the island city site today, was Ezekiel wrong?  Remember, the mainland site is indeed "a bare rock," and no city has ever been rebuilt there.  Furthermore, the switch in Ezekiel's language from "he" (Nebuchadnezzar) to "they" (Alexander and the Muslims mainly) to "I" may imply the last part of Tyre's drama will be played out when God directly intervenes during the Second Coming and beyond.  By this understanding, this prophecy isn't totally fulfilled yet.  Even as it is, the town of Sur has no organic and direct tie to ancient Tyre, since hundreds of years lie between Tyre's destruction by the Muslims in the thirteenth century and the resettlers of the eighteen century.  For example, no buildings of old Tyre survived to be used by the present inhabitants of Sur‑‑unlike the case for Jerusalem.  Furthermore, some fishermen must be living nearby to supply the nets to be dried on the rocks of Tyre‑‑they aren't going to sail miles out of their way to do that![2]  The witness of the mainland site's desolation should be enough to convince skeptics.

 

              THE CITY OF SIDON, TYRE'S RIVAL IN PHOENICIA

 

Twenty-two miles up the Lebanese coast, Sidon was the mother city of Tyre.  Although mentioned together often in the Bible, Sidon's fate was to be quite different.

 

Thus says the Lord God, "Behold, I am against you, O Sidon . . . For I shall send pestilence to her and blood to her streets, and the wounded will fall in her midst by the sword upon her on every side; Then they will know that I am the Lord.  (Eze. 28:22-23)

 

Notice how the prediction prophesies a war torn future for Sidon, but nothing about her total destruction, complete abandonment, or never being inhabited again.  Even today, Sidon remains a Lebanese port of some significance, although the capital of Beirut (to the north) is presently more important.  After rebelling against the Persian Empire in 351 b.c., the city beat off the initial Persian attempts to quell her.  Following betrayal by her king, 40,000 of Sidon's citizens chose to set fire to their own homes and die rather than let the conquering Persians torture them.  Three times it changed hands between the Crusaders and Muslims during the Middle Ages.  Even in modern times, it has been the scene of conflicts between the Druzes and Turks, the Turks and the French.  In 1840, the fleets of France, England, and Turkey bombarded Sidon.  Clearly, blood has been spilled in her streets‑‑but each time after being destroyed or damaged, Sidon was quickly rebuilt.  Even when the city revolted against Assyrian rule in 677 b.c. and got destroyed in retaliation, the Assyrians created a new provincial capital called "Fort Esarhaddon" on or near the site of the old city.  Now, if Ezekiel had switched Tyre's name for Sidon's, wouldn't his prophecies have been proven wrong?[3]  Nobody came along to toss Sidon's ruins into the sea!  How did he know so far in advance that Tyre's fate would be so much worse than Sidon's?  How was he able to get the specific details correct?  Both cities' ancient inhabitants worshipped false gods using idols, something which Jehovah, the God of Israel, condemned time and time again through His prophets.  Rationally speaking, is it plausible Ezekiel just blindly guessed correctly the different destinies of these two cities, although both were similarly sinful in his God's sight?

 

 

 

                 THE FATE OF GAZA, ASHKELON, AND ASHDOD,

                                 CITIES OF THE PHILISTINES

 

One of the leading traditional enemies of Israel, against whom mighty Samson focused his heroics, were the Philistines.  Once living along the Mediterranean coast, devastation for the Philistines' major cities and the end of their national existence was predicted (Eze. 25:15-17; Amos 2:6-8; Jer. 47:5).  In particular, notice the grim fates in store for the cities of Ashdod, Gaza, Ashkelon, and Ekron:

 

For Gaza will be abandoned, and Ashkelon a desolation; Ashdod will be driven out at noon, and Ekron will be uprooted . . . So the seacoast will be pastures, with caves for shepherds and folds for flocks.  And the coast will be for the remnant of the house of Judah.  They will pasture on it.  In the houses of Ashkelon they will lie down at evening; For the Lord their God will care for them and restore their fortune.  (Zephaniah 2:4-5, 6-7)

 

As Eze. 25:15-17 and Zephaniah 2:5 predicted, the Philistines ceased to be an identifiable nation, unlike the Jews.  Ashkelon's fate is portrayed differently from the rest.  Remaining inhabited and an operational port until the Sultan Bibars destroyed it in 1270, Ashkelon's natural harbor then was intentionally filled with stones to render it useless.  A Turkish garrison remained in it until the seventeenth century.  As Zephaniah predicted, sheepherding occurred around its site.  Most remarkably, since the modern establishment of the state of Israel, Ashkelon has been rebuilt as a "garden city."  Indeed today "the remnant of the house of Judah" does lie down "in the houses of Ashkelon" at evening!  By contrast, the present-day Palestinian city of Gaza isn't built on the site of its ancient namesake.  Although some thought this prophecy was wrong, the ruins of ancient Philistine city of Gaza were found some distance away.  During his conquest of Persia, Alexander the Great took this city, killed many of its inhabitants, and sold the survivors into slavery.  Buried under sand dunes today, indeed "baldness has come upon Gaza"! (Jer. 47:5).  As for Ekron, its location has been evidently lost, after being inhabited until the time of the Crusaders in the Middle Ages.  Tell Miqne is the most probable location.  Having been tilled in recent times, it remains unsettled.  Hence, the "remnant of Judah" dwells in Ashkelon today, but neither Ekron nor Gaza.[4]  Without supernatural guidance, how could have Zephaniah have foretold the future so accurately?  Couldn't he have randomly switched Gaza's or Ekron's name with Ashkelon, and criticized as wrong (at least to date)? 

 

 

 

                        THEBES  (NO)  AND  MEMPHIS  (NOPH),

            MAJOR  EGYPTIAN  CITIES  WITH  DIFFERENT FATES

 

Hugging the Nile River as its lifeline, ancient Egypt boasted one of the world's earliest civilizations.  Two of its major cities were Thebes (No or No-Amon in Egyptian) and Memphis (Noph).  Thebes was the dominant city of southern (upper) Egypt, while Memphis was one of the capitals from which the Pharaohs ruled and the dominant city of northern (lower) Egypt.  (Since the Nile flows from the south to the north, unlike most major rivers, "upper" corresponds with "southern," and "lower" with "northern.")  Since Egypt was the nation that oppressed Israel as slaves and was a dominant power in Middle Eastern politics for many centuries, these two cities naturally drew the attention of the Hebrew prophets for their idolatry (worshiping false gods using statues).  First, consider the fate of Memphis, as prophesied by Ezekiel:

 

Thus says the Lord God, I will also destroy idols and make the images cease from Memphis.  And there will no longer be a prince in the land of Egypt; and I will put fear in the land of Egypt.  And I will make Pathros desolate, set a fire in Zoan and execute judgments on Thebes. . . . I will also cut off the multitude of Thebes.  And I will set a fire in Egypt; Sin will writhe in anguish, Thebes will be breached, and Memphis will have distresses daily.  (Eze. 30:13-16)

 

Most remarkably, these predictions were fulfilled.  Although the Assyrians under Esarhaddon (670 b.c.) and the Persians under Cambyses (525 b.c.) captured Memphis, the city recovered much of its former position.  After visiting it, the Greek geographer Strabo (64 b.c.-after 23 A.D.) declared it second in size to the Egyptian port of Alexandria.  But Memphis's doom came with the Muslim invasion of Egypt in the seventh century A.D.  After the invading Islamic army conquered Egypt, the caliph Umar (ruled 634-644 A.D.) ordered it not to settle in Alexandria, buy property or take root in Egypt.  As a result, it took up residence in an encampment near the fort that had protected Memphis.  Over the centuries, this army base (Fustat) became the city of Cairo, Egypt's modern capital.  Memphis was progressively abandoned in the meantime, with its people drifting over to Cairo.  While one Arab traveler of the thirteen century, Abdul-Latif, declared Memphis to be a "collection of wonderful works," later on the very site was lost.  Why?  The buildings/ruins of Memphis became a convenient quarry for Cairo.  As a result, hardly any stonework was left above ground.  The founder of modern scientific archeology, the English Egyptologist Flinders Petrie (1853-1942) commented about the Temple of Ptah area in what once was Memphis:  "The site has been so much exhausted for building stone in the Arab ages, that it is not likely that a complete turning over of the whole ground would repay the work."  Amelia Edwards commented that the few ruins remaining were hardly worth observing and could easily be listed:  "One can hardly believe that a great city ever flourished on this spot."  This desolation clearly shows the idols of Memphis ceased to exist, just as Ezekiel foresaw.

 

THE FATE OF THEBES, ONCE THE CAPITAL OF ANCIENT EGYPT

 

The leading ancient Egyptian city in upper Egypt (i.e. further up the Nile from the Mediterranean, some 330 miles south of modern Cairo), Thebes's fate differed some from Memphis's.  Being a center of the worship of the god Amon, Thebes also served as the capital of ancient Egypt for centuries.  Here tourists can still visit the huge temple complexes at Karnak and Luxor.  Across the Nile on its west bank lies the famous "Valley of the Kings" where Howard Carter found the tomb of Tutankhamen ("King Tut") in 1923.  Although the Assyrian king Ashurbanipal, the Babylonian king Nebuchadnezzar, and the Persian king Cambyses all took and destroyed Thebes, it was still revived each time.  Centuries later, Thebes in 92-89 b.c. suffered a three-year siege by Ptolemy Lathyrus (Cleopatra's grandfather) before getting sacked and burned in punishment.  Although Thebes recovered once again, Cornelius Gallus destroyed it (30-29 b.c.) for good during the reign of the Roman emperor Augustus (27 b.c.-14 A.D.) for joining a tax revolt.  The area the city occupied became a small collection of villages.  Nine of them mark the spot today.  But the ruins remain impressive, complete with many, many idols.  When he wrote, Francis Llewellyn Griffith maintained:  "Thebes still offers the greatest assemblage of monumental ruins in the world."  Importantly, as Ezekiel's prophecy outlined, Thebes suffered from a much more violent history than Memphis's before its very violent end.  Ezekiel said Jehovah would "execute judgments on Thebes," would "cut off [kill] the multitude of Thebes," and that "Thebes would be breached."  By contrast, besides having her idols destroyed, Memphis merely would have "distresses daily."  The multitude of Thebes was suddenly cut off, but Memphis's population just drifted a few miles away to Cairo over the centuries.  The ruins of Thebes are far more impressive than the scraps that meet the traveler's eye at Memphis:  The idols still stand at Thebes, but not at Memphis.  Suppose Ezekiel had switched the names of the two cities.  Since the idols have not been cut off from Thebes, he easily could have been called wrong (the escape clause of saying it wasn't yet fulfilled wouldn't look very promising).  Skeptics might claim Ezekiel wrote out of some uninspired emotional Hebrew proto-nationalism that hated Egypt and desired its downfall.  But then, had he randomly reversed these two cities' names, unbelievers easily could have stamped him as wrong.  So then, did he merely "guess" right?  Isn't it more sensible, given the mute testimony of the stones in Egypt, to say Ezekiel had supernatural help?[5]

 

                     OTHER PREDICTIONS MADE ABOUT EGYPT

 

Consider other predictions made against Egypt.  Although Egypt had been a glorious civilization for centuries, even millennia, when Ezekiel prophesied, he still boldly predicted its coming fall from greatness: 


And I shall turn the fortunes of Egypt and shall make them return to the land of Pathros [upper Egypt between roughly Aswan and Cairo], to the land of their origin; and there they will be a lowly kingdom.  It will be the lowest of the kingdoms; and it will never again lift itself up above the nations.  And I shall make them so small that they will not rule over the nations.  (Eze. 29:14-15)

 

Since the time Ezekiel lived, other nations and empires have repeatedly conquered Egypt, including Persia, Greece, Rome, the Arabs, the Turks, the French, and finally the British.  Although independent today, Egypt is a relatively insignificant Third World country which has lost some four wars against Israel in the past half century.  Notice how its fate differed from Assyria's or Babylon's‑‑today Egypt still exists, but total desolation overcame the two Mesopotamian civilizations.  Egypt was also no longer to be ruled by its own kings:  "And there will no longer be a prince in the land of Egypt" (Eze. 30:13).  The line of Pharaohs with even some minimal semi-independence ended with the reestablishment of Persian rule in 341 b.c.  Almost ever since, Egypt generally has endured foreign overlords and/or foreign monarchs.[6]  A critic can't say that the Bible only predicts about the destruction of cities or empires‑‑in Egypt's case it predicts its humbling and abasement despite its past centuries of great power, but not its destruction.

 

PROPHECIES AGAINST EDOM, A RIVAL OF ISRAEL, FULFILLED

 

 Once occupying an area nearly the size of New Jersey to Israel's southeast, the kingdom of Edom had an especially grim future predicted for it.  Isaiah 34:9-15; Jeremiah 49:17-18; Ezekiel 25:13-14; 35:5-9 all predict Edom's permanent desolation and destruction.  Jeremiah even predicted "no one will live there," while Isaiah predicted "none shall pass through it forever and ever."  Although their language sounds extravagant, especially because cities in the Middle East were often rebuilt after their devastation, but it has almost literally been fulfilled.  Despite Ezekiel prophesied during the time Nebuchadnezzar was applying pressure against Judah, who finally virtually leveled Jerusalem (587 b.c.) and hauled the Jews into exile in Babylon, he still predicted Judah would defeat Edom one day.  Since Judah had just endured utterly total defeat, his prediction would have seemed absurd in the early sixth century b.c.  Nevertheless, during the Maccabean Wars of the second century b.c. it actually happened, when Judas Maccabeus defeated them.  (See I Maccabees 5:3, as found in Catholic Bibles).  Attacking them as well were John Hyrcanus, who forced them to accept Judaism, and Simon of Gerasa.  Although the Edomites took advantage of Rome's impending siege of Jerusalem in 70 A.D. to rob and kill the Jews therein, soon afterwards they disappear from history.  (Rome took formal control of Petra and the Nabataean kingdom that had absorbed Edom in 106 A.D.)  Today, Edom's stone city of Petra stands out as one of the most spectacular set of ruins in the world, since it has buildings hewn from cliffs of bare rock.  Around the beginning of the first century A.D., the Greek geographer Strabo reported that Petra was a major terminal for caravans crossing the Middle East from Asia.  Later, the city had already fallen into decline when the Arabs invaded the area in the seventh century.  The Crusaders built a castle there in the twelfth century.  But soon afterwards the outside world forgot about the city's very existence, until the Swiss traveler J.L. Burckhardt discovered it in 1812.  Once a center of the Eurasian caravan trade, the caravan routes shifted elsewhere and Petra was abandoned.  The sounds of jackals and owls at night and the presence of scorpions under its rocks have given visitors (like Arab nomads) good reasons to avoid hanging around.  The rarity of people staying long or inhabiting significantly this region is sufficient evidence for this prophecy's fulfillment.[7]

 

                       ALEXANDER THE GREAT'S SUCCESSFUL

            INVASION OF PERSIA PREDICTED LONG IN ADVANCE

 

The prophet Daniel, writing during the period 605-536 b.c., predicted Greece would destroy the Persian Empire.  Using a goat to stand for Greece, and a ram to symbolize Persia, he wrote:

 

While I was observing [in a prophetic vision], behold, a male goat was coming from the west over the surface of the whole earth without touching the ground; and the goat had a conspicuous horn between his eyes.  And he came up to the ram that had the two horns, which I had seen standing in front of the canal, and rushed at him in his mighty wrath. . . .  So he [the goat] hurled him [the ram] to the ground and trampled on him, and there was none to rescue the ram from his power. . . .  The ram which you saw with two horns represented the kings of Media and Persia.  And the shaggy goat represented the kingdom of Greece, and the large horn that is between his eyes is the first king. (Dan. 8:5-7, 20-21; cf. Dan. 11:2-4).

 

Over two hundred years after Daniel's death, his inspired predictions came true.  Alexander the Great invaded and conquered Persia during the years 334-330 b.c.